Apple has problems: the company will run out of money due to decreased sales of iPhones. This is due to the insufficient supply of new firmware. Ming-Chi Kuo reports this in his Medium.
The main iPhone assembler, Foxconn, has been unable to return to the planned results for more than a month. Assembly lines were only 20% busy in November. December, according to forecasts, will not get much better: the lines will be used by a maximum of 40%. Thus, in the fourth quarter, Apple will ship 15-20 million iPhone models mentioned less than planned. Their circulation will be 70-75 million units.
The reason is another outbreak of covid. At first, the lines were stopped, then they lost many employees who fled the plant in Zhangzhou – the workers feared another lockdown within the walls of the enterprise. There are riots and protests because Foxconn cannot pay the money, keeps workers in poor conditions, and does not provide quality medicines.
According to Mr. Kuo, the lack of supply of iPhones could be alarming for the company’s shares, which will fall due to lower revenue, which Apple will announce in late January. Then the report on the first financial quarter of 2023 will be published (it began on October 1, 2022).
Part of the orders for the production of “firmware” – the highest-margin iPhones – were transferred to assemblers Pegatron and Luxshare ICT. However, their share does not exceed 10% of the required quantity, and the first shipments of the assembled devices will not occur until the end of December.